Political commentator, Enerst Thindwa says the former ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) needs a new leader for the party to stand a chance of bouncing back and rule this country again.

The remarks come after the recent shake up which have taken place in the party where Grezelder Jeffrey was fired as Secretary General and Ben Phiri stepped down as director of Elections.

Thindwa added that the party’s leader, Peter Mutharika should retire from politics and hold no other position in the party in older for the party to democratically identify the new leader.

“In as long as Mutharika maintains his place the Democratic process to identify the leader will not be adhered to therefore that will have an impact on the leadership and leader to be which will negatively impact on the prospects of DPP going forward,” said Thindwa

He further added that DPP run the risk of taking the same path as Alliance for Democracy (Aford) and United Democratic Front (UDF)

“Aford and UDF the mistake they made was that leadership was not subject to contestation, the reason Aford and UDF are struggling, since it’s inception Aford is being headed by Chihana and UDF is being headed by Muluzi and the party’s fortunes have declined significantly if not the party’s are almost out of the Malawi’s political landscape, so DPP runs the same risk if they don’t open up leadership for contestation,” he said

The former governing DPP was shown the exit door by the Tonse Alliance after six years at the helm of running the country in the fresh presidential elections in 2019.